The values of war criminals

Klaus Madersbacher

Think about Hitler what you like, but there is one crime he did not knowingly commit - the crime against peace. This may sound surprising, but the crime against peace did not exist in his time, therefore he could not commit it ... no, I am not a lawyer:-))

War has always been "the continuation of politics by other means," but unleashing a war of aggression per se was not explicitly classified as a crime by the international community at the time. The important thing was to achieve victory, otherwise you were in for it and "victors' justice" struck - "Vae victis - Woe to the vanquished" was the motto, whether they had started the war or not.

The question of who had started a war was not so important, war was seen as a kind of elemental force that burst upon countries and devastated them under any pretext. However, it had to be made plausible to one's own population, which was exposed to great burdens by the war, that it was a just war and wanted by God, why the enemy had to be destroyed and so on. This was not so difficult in earlier times, because the mostly uneducated people still believed every nonsense that the nobility and churches pushed on them. Of course, it was always about power and money, but there was no talk about that.

Hitler and his Nazis, of course, did not expect that their so well planned and prepared venture, namely to make Germany the number one in the world, would perish so miserably. They were not the first with this attitude - and as you can see, they were not the last either. Only, unlike their successors in the Ungeist, they did not have to reckon with having to appear before an internationally staffed court and being sentenced according to laws that did not yet exist in their day. Some die-hard Nazis - Stahlhelm on the outside, Denksperre on the inside - [probably a number of lawyers among them] are still upset today about the "injustice of the victors' justice at Nuremberg".

As already stated several times on this website, after the Second World War new crimes were added to the catalog of international law: the crime against peace, i.e. the unleashing of a war of aggression, crimes against humanity and perhaps others that do not play a role here.

Nazi leaders were convicted of the crime against peace after the Nuremberg trial and hanged for participating in the preparation, planning, and execution of a war of aggression. One of the new things was that politicians and generals were tried and hanged as criminals, which had been rare until then. Of course, there were always revenge measures against them, but "noble status" and "officer's honor" often offered sufficient protection, especially since their peers on the victorious side took care that their kind remained scot-free - not much different from today, as long as they were not Africans or Serbs.

With their claim that "Nuremberg" falls under "victors' justice" let the old Nazis be right for all I care.

It is true that the Nazi leaders were hanged under a law created for a newly discovered category of crimes. The only silly thing is that this law has never been applied since World War II, although a series of criminal wars of aggression have been fought in the meantime. The terrorist superpower that is more or less behind all these criminal wars of aggression, namely the United States of America, even puts the feather in its cap of having been instrumental in the development of the Nuremberg Regulations. This makes me think some very nasty thoughts, but I want to keep them to myself now.

Walter Rockler, American prosecutor at the Nuremberg trial, expresses himself clearly enough in his letters to the editor of the Chicago Tribune and calls the NATO invasion of Yugoslavia a crime against peace according to "Nuremberg": "The War Crimes Act also applies to the United States of America" and "U.S. aggression". Also in the game is Germany, which has perhaps already displaced the Führer, or at least believes it has done so.

What the Anglo-American "coalition" has done before and since the invasion of Iraq are crimes against peace, crimes against humanity and war crimes of every kind. Is there a rooster crowing about this? Bush, Blair, Cheney and consorts ("the presumption of innocence applies") are walking around free, getting celebrated, selling their memoirs and having a good time.

An interesting rationale for why the armies of the Anglo-American coalition can't finally withdraw from Iraq is: "After all the sacrifice and service we've done for this country, we can't just pull out." Nicely put, Obama, Cameron, or whoever, Hitler couldn't have said it better ... at least the college professor Obama would have to know what the crime against peace is all about.

A crime against peace is clearly also the war against Afghanistan. Mainly due to the dust raised by the WTC towers blown up by obviously first-class experts together with the skyscraper WTC7 - "into which not even a plane flew" - on 9/11 at the scene of the crime and worldwide, forming one of the most exquisite smoke screens in history, a legally completely indefensible illegal war of aggression of the United States of America under the Bush regime against Afghanistan was literally "fogged". The German government obviously found and finds nothing wrong with participating "in the Hindu Kush" in a war of the kind for which its predecessors were hanged at the time. Even neutral Austria sees no problem in sending soldiers of its armed forces there. The country's numerous highly paid legal experts have more important things to do than fritter away their valuable time on such trifles ...

France and Italy, but also Norway and others - the terrorist superpower United States of America discreetly in the background, but still leading participated in the targeted and systematic devastation of peaceful Libya in a crime without equal. A crime against peace that could hardly be worse.

And now it's Syria's turn.

Among other things, with Belgian warplanes bombing Syrians to death and destroying Syrian infrastructure. Committing crimes against peace in Hitler's footsteps. In good company, in a coalition of the good, which after all represents the values of the free world. And waging a criminal war of aggression against a country that does not obey. Whether the Belgians know this or only the Belgian government does not matter, because the orders come from Washington anyway.

Whether the Germans or the French or the subjects of their British Majesty or other majesties or the Austrians or the Italians or the Swiss or any other Europeans believe all that doesn't really matter. Because the Europeans are not that clever. They let themselves be dumbed down just like their "transatlantic" partners, who have been worked on for decades with first-class know-how. They are destined to be available as cannon fodder in the foreseeable future, when the overlords blow the whistle for a world war, because their world is once again becoming too small for them. Too small a world - too small profits, get it?

If not, be at least aware that your turn will come, to the higher glory of the Empire, if that's any consolation to you ...

Crimes against peace - who cares?